28. 27 #3
I shrugged, again. “It is a minor wound, compared to some.” I looked up at Samiscus, staring down at the two of us. “But I’ve never worked out how to close it. With Ekris, that is the closest I’ve been to feeling whole.”
Fella followed my gaze. “I get it.”
We stood there in silence, and then Fella offered me the drink, tapping the cold metal to my arm. I refused with a wave of my hand, and she nodded.
She took another drink, and shook her head as she swallowed it. “Well, fuck. I appreciate the honesty.”
It was my turn to grimace. “I shouldn’t have asked you to tell me anything.”
“It was in poor taste, but I can see it was not ill meant. Have you ever meant ill in your life?”
I nodded, once. “I have thought ill of others many times, and at times, I have desired to do ill by them.”
Fella only raised her eyebrow.
I blushed, though I couldn’t quite say why.
Fella sighed, and stared up at her god. She shrugged. “A deal is a deal.”
“You don’t have to—”
“I lost a child,” she said quickly. “I was barely an adult, and she was born still. My husband blamed me. He called me a witch, and cast me out. I walked with that babe in my arms for days until I reached this House. I begged Camriel to let me in, to let me pray at Samiscus’ altar.”
It was a tour of the worst tragedy of her life, spoken as fast as she drank. She had lost her baby. A girl. A girl she had actually wanted enough to carry all the way here. “You wanted to bring her back?”
Fella was silent for several seconds, and then she nodded.
“I had heard the myth. Samiscus came to me as I begged. I heard his voice and I thought—” Her breath left her quickly, then she regained her composure.
“But he refused. I—I did not take it well. He saw the worst of my grief, all the pain that I hadn’t allowed to be real until this tiny chance was gone. ”
She took another drink, and the sparkle came back into her eyes.
“The grief is long dead now. But in my convalescence, I spoke more with Camriel. He had his own young son. This House became a home. My bitterness turned to a slow gratitude. Samiscus marked me as his own.” She raised her hand to the statue.
“This is my family now. All the people here. Some of them are quite normal, even. Not everyone comes to Samiscus because of some terrible tragedy.”
She winked at me, but I couldn’t manage a smile.
I was very glad she had found a new family in the worst time in her life.
Finding a God who could lessen the pain might have very well saved her life.
I couldn’t imagine her in any other House, with any other family.
But the horror of her tale, and the idea of the journey she had made: it was awful.
“I’m so sorry,” I said.
“Don’t be,” she replied without hesitation. “My life has been rich and interesting. I have found bonds so much deeper than I ever thought possible.”
“Can I ask something about her?”
Fella stiffened, but nodded.
“What was her name?”
Fella’s hand clenched at her side. “Lora.”
I smiled. “Lora. It’s a lovely name.”
Fella reached out her hand. She offered her palm and I took it immediately. She squeezed my hand and looked down at ours entwined. Mine was paler than hers, and smaller. “We are alike, you know.”
I swallowed heavily. “Do you think so?”
Of course, I wanted to be like Fella. So self-assured and so strong.
“We each owe our gods a debt for saving us from the hardest moments of our lives,” she said, flicking her eyes to Samiscus. Then she winked at me. “But you’re still young. You haven’t realised the second part. The best part.”
“Which is?”
A faint smile played on her mouth. “You saved yourself, too.”
That wasn’t true. I hadn’t done anything. I looked down at our hands and I tried to move back. “I—”
“Annie.” She squeezed my hand harder, drawing my eyes back to her, and there was nothing in her gaze but sincerity.
“You left. You left. You made your way to the city, alone. You found Yona. You convinced Talia. You spoke to Ekris. There is value in your gratitude, and there is value in your piety. But never forget that there was nothing but you in that head of yours when you opened that barn door, and ran away.”
I found it hard to deny her, even in this godly place.
I had been alone and unloved, just as she had been.
And I had advocated for myself. Though, that last part, about the barn door, that was her story and not mine.
A hint of her narrative, being woven into my life.
Before coming to this city, before finding our Gods and our people, we were both lost. Her in that barn, and me on that forsaken farm.
“Thank you,” I said.
Maybe it was all meant to happen this way, for both of us: maybe the Gods designed it to be so, for our paths to meet after tragedy. Or maybe she was right, and I wasn’t driven by anything higher than myself when I stole away on that wagon.
Still, the gods were watching, so before we left I gave Samiscus a queasy smile and a silent prayer. It was best not to take chances.